no more slavery, men of all coloursmade equal, the rich giving their goods to feed the poor? And if there had been one to whom he could say it, how feeble and ineffective the words would have been, how incomplete the other’s understanding. And how, even to himself, could he explain that this vision was inextricably connected with the two men in peculiar hats. But it was…. And he must, somehow, find those two men.
He went to his bed and lay and gave serious thought to a subject he had not really considered since he was a boy in the old slave-trainer’s establishment in Alexandria—how to run away and not be caught. In a civilisation based upon slavery this was an extremely difficult thing to do, and doubly difficult if you happened to be black. And the punishments devised for runaway slaves were deliberately designed to deter all but those already made crazy by ill-treatment. In addition to being black he was a eunuch—and no free man, save an ecstasy-drunk priest of Baal who had mutilated himself, was that.
Still he thought, sturdily, even a black man, even a eunuch, might have bought himself free, or been manumitted.
Now, he thought, pursuing that thought, if my master the Greek, or my master Metellus, or my mistress the Lady, had manumitted me, I should carry a paper, signed or sealed.
The Lady had never troubled to learn how to write her name, but she had a seal, a great square topaz set in silver, which, when she pressed it into the hot wax which Balthazar had prepared, left in the wax a sheep’s head in the centre and in each corner the initials of her personal and family names. (Her father’s wealth had been made from sheep; once there had been a great sickness and thousands of sheep had died; his had stayed healthy and he had been able to sell a ewe in lamb for the price usually charged for a tiger, an elephant or a fully trained performing bear,) She never, even in a temper, let the seal out of her keeping, and demented as many of her actions were Balthazar knew that there was no hope of presenting her with a forged manumission paper, amongst several others and getting her to seal it. Where anything concerned with business or money was concerned she was very shrewd. But he had, in his possession, many of the little clay tokens which it was his duty to give to tenants in exchange for their money, their corn, their jars of oil, or wine which constituted their rent. Every quarter, as he went round he issued new clay tablets, a different colour for each new quarter, and collected the old ones. It was just possible that he could smear the face of one of these stamped tokens with oil and press it against some fresh-dribbled wax. He would then have a replica of the Lady’s seal…. Next day he wrote himself a document of manumission, phrased, although he did not know it, almost in the very words which Marcus, that clever lawyer, at Metellus’ bidding, had used. Then he forged the seal. Transferred from topaz to clay and from clay to wax and then to wax again it lacked the sharp, immediate impact of the original; but looking at it critically he thought it would fool most people.
There were other cunning little moves to make. In the ordinary way he spent two days on his journey, two days rent-collecting, two days on his way home. But this time, before he left, with the forged document tucked into his breast, he said:
“My Lady; the increase in rents that you have ordered will bother these people and may cause some delay. The usual rent they have, hidden in the wall or under the floor, if it is in cash; put aside in barn or storehouse, if in kind. Faced with the increase most of the tenants will be obliged to run to the moneylender, or fill other sacks and jars. I say this because this may take me more than six days.”
She said, “Did I not make myself clear? I want this increase; I need it. And you are to stay there until the last penny, the last grain of corn, the last drop of oil or wine, has been yielded up.”
“That might mean, my Lady, that I should be absent for two weeks.”
“What of it?” she said.
“Do you think that I shall pine for the sight of your ugly face? I know what you are thinking of. In this house you eat full and sleep soft. For two weeks you’ll miss your comforts. Three even, if some of them have to sell their children to meet my demands.”
Yes, it might even be three weeks before she missed him and said, “Where is Balthazar?” And, after that, at least two days’ grace, waiting, wondering, expectant. And then the hue and cry; runaway, a neutered slave, black, the fingers of his right hand bent, aged forty, hair turning grey, when last seen wearing… He knew it all, he thought as he passed from the Lady’s presence for what he hoped with all his heart would be the last time. Once she knew, and the news was out, everybody would be on the alert, avid for the reward.
But he had at least two, at best three, weeks; he had, if challenged, his forged document; and he had on the one hand his hope, on the other his despair. If he failed, if his dream like everything else in his life simply led to disappointment and he was brought back, he would take his fifty lashes and his branding, and he would die… On the night before he left ‘he gave sensible consideration as to the best direction to choose. The really practical thing, he knew, was to go to the estate at Babila, spend a day collecting the rents that were immediately available and then disappear from there; he would thus acquire money for his journey, he could buy the camel and the clothes which, in his vision, had seemed to be his. But this procedure was distasteful to him, not only because he had never stolen a penny in his life, but because it seemed wrong to start out in pursuit of something unspeakably wonderful by committing a theft. Also—and it was amazing how even a slave could find reasons for not doing what he didn’t want to do—to act in this way would be to act exactly as the Lady, when he failed to turn up, would guess that he had acted. She would send first to Babila, two days’ journey to the east; by moving westwards at once he would add four days to the time he had in hand. So he would go west; taking with him the few coins he was allowed to purchase food. Apart from that he had nothing, for in Edessa—or at least in the Lady’s household, the charitable custom of making small money presents to slaves on certain days was not honoured; nor had she allowed him to write a letter or make a reckoning for anyone other than herself. He had attempted it in his early days in Edessa, where there were plenty of ignorant persons willing to pay for such a service. The Lady had said, simply and spitefully, “If you can’t find enough work to keep you busy on my business, just tell me, and I will help you.” He had known what that meant!
So, meanly clad, his shoes already broken, and with just money enough to purchase one evening meal, he set out, very early in the morning, and turned west as soon as he reached the city’s boundary. Then, for two days, he dared not use the highway for fear of being seen by someone who knew the Lady and might recognise him and report. Walking across country in this way was a slow process, for he was traversing a belt of highly cultivated land upon which Edessa depended for its market produce and the plots were divided by walls of stone loosely piled upon one another, by fences, by irrigation ditches. Also there were no shops where food could be purchased. On the first day, except for the ‘dawn-bit’ which he had eaten before setting out, he ate nothing at all; on the second, seeing a woman outside a lonely little house, milking a tethered goat, he had approached her and asked could she sell him something to eat. She rose to her feet, looked at him, with fear and then, searchingly, all round; looking for his accomplices.
“I am alone,” he told her.
“And I am not a beggar; I can pay.”
Her expression did not change, but she nodded, and taking up the bowl of milk, went into the house, walking in the stiff-legged way of one who wishes to hurry but deliberately refrains from doing so. He heard the bolt on-the inside of the door jolt into place.